I think the geek crew at TCL today probably have about the same opinions as to what makes a good network good as we had back when we had our hands in the routers in AS4768. The geeks certainly know what makes a good network and nearly all (probably all in fact) would agree
Y'all, Joe wrote: that good domestic peering is an important part of what makes a good Internet network provider. So don't hold the "geeks" responsbible for this de-peering action.
I suspect that any de-peering that is going on at TCL is based on business decisions which are not made by the geek crew. I don't think it's reasonable to attribute this stuff to those people.
My guess at what the "business desicion" logic behind such a move is, is that TCL feel that they have a sufficient enough market share of the Internet customers in NZ such that giving other providers free domestic access to their customers does not recover any of the cost that they are/have outlayed to build a nationwide network, fibre backbone etc etc. I don't personally agree with this attitude, if it is true. In fact, in my opinion, it goes against the spirit of the Internet as a whole. However the reality of todays Internet is that people are trying to make money out of it now! I have recently approached XTRA about peering for the 5th time on my life and received the same answer - "no". Mind you the answer is always "no" until you ask :) What is XTRAs or Global Gateways' position on domestic peering? My current understanding is that TCL is just taking a stance that is already taken by others. ~benm #include <disclaimer.h>